Hi Everyone,

Please can you circulate this to everyone in BBG that is not listed
above. Tim will post this on the forum but if you could please pass
this on too, this will make sure everyone gets this in time for the
meeting. That would be great. Thanks.

We have been made aware that a number of potential and existing BBG
members find that they feel excluded as a result of the closed
meetings, and that these meetings create an air of exclusivity.

Attendance to the closed meetings has dropped off, and so has the
numbers of BBG members who attend the other sessions. We are also
not attracting new members and finances have become a cause of
concern. It seems that conditions have changed and we need to find a
new way to keep BBG inclusive, open and friendly to attract new
members, whilst keeping sessions that support a deeper more in-depth
investigation into the practise.

We have decided to have a meeting to these ends on Thursday 25th
September. For those of you who can attend, your support and ideas
will be truly appreciated, and we will need to agree on a way
forward.

If you can not attend but want to share your thoughts, please email
me at brook.studios@..., and I will make sure your emails
are read aloud at the meeting.

Initial discussions have come up with the following ideas. If you
would like to add to, show support of, concerns about, or expand on
any of these ideas, please let us know.

1. Have a separate closed study group at someone's house on a
different night, keeping BBG Thursday's for ALL BBG members, so
encouraging new members and old members to return.

2. Open up the study group - no more closed meetings - give people
the opportunity to join in and encourage everyone to be responsible
for themselves. If they don't understand something - ask . To
support newcomers, we could also write up some Bodhicharya intro
notes covering the basics. These can be given to new people prior to
them coming. If someone feels awkward in a meeting, let them either
work with it as their practise or raise the issue in the group. We
could support them by introducing a question/suggestion box that
could be read out monthly. It could be anonymous but with a few
rules to follow eg anything deemed as a personal attack or offensive
will not be read out.

3. If you want commitment from people, set a minimum attendee
number. For example, ask people to sign up and commit to coming,
take a head count each week, and if the group drops below 70%
attendance for three or more sessions in a row, then the course will
stop. We can have a standard email that gets sent out to everyone
should the course become at risk. If people know the course will end
when they don't regularly come, and they want to keep it going, they
will come. If we stop a course we are then free to start a new
course if we want :0) ( the suggestions box could also be used to
suggest new courses).

4. Advertise regularly to attract new members - let people know what
we do on a Thursday evening, what sort of topics we discuss, courses
we run, group and guided meditations.

5. Pay for any study courses up front, this will help to commit
people to the course and ensure BBG's financial well-being.

6. Have more weekend day time events and advertise them. Have events
that are aimed to address the needs of potential new members, for
example "how to meditate" courses etc.

7. Extend the time of our evenings sessions so that all our evenings
start with an hour meditation session. This is open to anyone, and
will have the option to include guided meditations by different
experienced BBG members. After the meditation session, the second
half of the meeting can be used for any closed study courses, or
whatever else we are doing. This also has the benefit of being
regular and reliable - new people have complained that they cannot
remember what evening is what.

8. Have only one of the monthly study meetings closed for
Bodhicharya and the other study evening to run open short courses.

Hope to see you there
Pema
Pema Chalmers
07824 533 093
brook.studios@...